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hmm…i’ve always wondered why plain past tense i.e ta-form is always used to form the meaning “if” or “when” for this grammar tara. I’m not quite sure on the tenses….for example:

“もしぶかつに遅れたら….”

Directly translating would be like “if I had been late to club activity”, which suggest the future?? Also can you please tell me how you know when tara means “when” or “if” in a particular sentence? Thankyou :3

Hi again,
もしぶかつに遅れたら….”
You use past tense with たら but it could mean both “If I had been late /I were late” or “If I am late” depending on the context.

遅れたらみんなに迷惑をかけるだろう。I may/might trouble everyone. (talking about the possibility in future)
遅れたら迷惑をかけたかもしれない。I would have troubled everyone. (talking about hypothetical situation that didn’t happen in past.)

Basically, if you are talking about something likely to happen, the better translation will be “when” and if you are talking about hypothetical situation, “if” is better.

I prefer to view たら as meaning something like “it is the case that…” a certain action happened/took place instead of inherently meaning “if” because in some cases “if” doesn’t make sense. I think “it is the case that…” better encapsulates both cases when たらmeans “if” and when it means “after, when” and so confusion with this conjugation goes away.

Hello,
I am sorry but both sentences are not natural.
The verb tense in the following sentences can’t be simple past tense in this case.
ていた is better because it describes the state after the action or what has been happening.

窓の外を見たら、大勢の人が殺されていた。
窓の外を見たら、彼が大勢の人を殺していた。
When I looked out the windows, I saw* ~~
(There isn’t a verb to see (見る) in Japanese sentence but you describe what you saw by ていた)

If you use the simple past tense
窓の外を見たら、大勢の人が殺された。
窓の外を見たら、彼は大勢の人を殺した。
It sounds like the action of looking out the window 窓の外を見た caused people’s death or him killing people.

だったら・だとしたら both talk about the hypothetical situation but you can’t use としたら for the case 2)

１） hypothetical

それが本当だったら大変だ。
それが本当だとしたら大変だ。

としたら sounds slightly more formal and adds more hypothetical nuance.
（だ）としたら If it were the case / (The speaker doesn’t that is the case but for the argument sake) Let’s say if it were (You are talking about counterfactual thing)

2) You can use Xだったら・たら+ Y pattern when you simply talk about what is going to happen if X happens.
明日晴れだったら海に行きます。 / 明日晴れたら海に行きます。
明日晴れだとしたら海に行きます。/ 明日晴れたとしたら海に行きます。(not natural)

***
~たら The speaker think it may happen
そうだったら
If so, If it is true/ If that’s the case (talking about the current situation)

としたら: The speaker think it is not going to happen

そうだとしたら
(Let’s say) If it were true (talking about the current situation)

そうだったとしたら
(Let’s say)If it had been true (talking about the past event)

Maggie sensei, thank you for your explanation. If だったら and だとしたら are different,then だったら is not a contracted form of だとしたら? I read that this was the case from not just one, two websites so I thought it was correct..

OK I added the number in my previous sentence.
As I said some of the sentences in the usage 1) can be translated the same so some might interpret だったら is a contracted form.
But the original form is different.

Hello Sensei!
I have read many many thread or post on Japanese conditional;
but indeed it seems to me that the most used conditional is something else.
In Japanese to make a conditional clause you have to modify the sentence which express the condition:
お金があればいいね
If I had money, it would be good, huh?

the conditional clause here is ” いいね” but to make it conditional we have to modify “お金がある” in “お金があれば”.

So what if we do not want to express explicitly the condition?
Conditional also stand on his own.
for example what about this conversation:

A: “Hey do you like sushi??”
B: “Yes! I would eat it every day!”

Here there is a stand alone conditional “I would eat sushi every day” (maybe some condition is implicit);
anyway how do we express this in Japanese ??
:-D

I’m just wondering, what does the “死んでしまったら” means？
In the sentence もしあなたが死んでしまったら生きていけない。I get the part of 死ぬ
which means to die。I’ve searched it in the Index main lesson 2 page, but with no luck of finding it XD.

Ah, OK, the whole sentence makes more sense.
You sometimes switch the word order or drop a particle in conversation.
The whole sentence is
もしそうだったら、わたしは都合が悪いな。
If that’s the case, it is not good for me ( I am not available)

Konnichiha Maggie_Sensei
It’s me again, arigatou gozaimasu for responsing my prev question back there, but sensei i still have some issues about those, heard them from anime and couldn’t recognize them:

Hi,Ōsama,
First I am sorry but I don’t do the translation here. (If I do, I have to translate for everybody…)
I can explain the structure but can you post them in Japanese?
Maybe they are typos..but some of the phrases don’t make any sense.

Ex. ご飯できたら呼んで！ = Gohen dekitara yonde! = Call me when dinner is ready. {Umm…it should be gohan right?} I think it might be a typo, though my Kanji isn’t very good, so I might be wrong. Anyway, thanks for the lesson Maggie-sensei! It’s much better and more detailed than any other {tara} lesson i’ve read! :grin:

it’s not a pervert novel sensei, it’s just a romantic comedy kind of novel with some rpg element ^^

no pervert scene as far as I read it right now, just a touching scene (“touching” in something that can make us teary mean not the other meaning ^^) when… it’s a spoiler so I suggest you read it yourself sensei because it’s really a nice novel ^^

このハーブのシャンプーを使ったらここまで見事な髪になります。
= If you use this herb shampoo, your hair will be this beautiful.

So as you can see this たら make this sentence conditional.

Ex. 私もハーブのシャンプーを使ったらここまで見事な髪になりますか？
= If I use herb shampoo, do you think my hair will be this beautiful?

Again, this is a conditional sentence.
So
どんなシャンプーやリンスを使ったら、ここまで見事な髪になるんだろうな…。
means
I wonder what kind of shampoo or conditioners I should use to make my hair this beautiful.
(I wonder what kind of shampoo or conditioner would make my hair this beautiful. )

You did, except I asked to wrong question XD I actually wanted to ask, since you can’t use 行ったらいいのに to talk about yourself, is there another way to say “I should go/It would be good if I went” using the たら form? If not, Is there another way I can say it?

Hello!! Thank you for visiting this site!
I hope you understand how and when to use たら in this lesson. As you have seen たら is usually used in a conditional sentence.
時 is used as “when” and “if”. I think the later one confuses you more. Will put that on the request list.

Hi Maggie-Ssensei!
First, I want to say THANK YOU for doing a great job here!
Now my question:
There is:
a) ittara ii noni (Verb in conditional form/tara ii no ni) and

b) iketara ii no ni (Verb in potential form/tara ii no ni)

Whats the difference in usage and meaning of these two? I was told that a) is used only for 3. persons (I wish HE could go…) but I found lots of examples where both a) and b) are used in the same way. Could you please help? Thank you in advance!
Ele

マギー先生、返事をありがとうございます。私は「のに」のレッソンを2，3回読んでいましたが、この部分はまだ分かりません。「のに」のレッソンから：
誕生パーティーに行ったらいいのに。
I wish someone would go to the birthday party / You should go to the party.
動詞の形：行くー＞行ったら
自分の望み表現する時、行けるー＞「行けたら」可能形を使いました：誕生パーティーに行けたらいいのに
この文書：
JLPTの１級に受かったらいいのに。
動詞の形：受かるー＞受かったら
どうしてこの文章には可能形を使わないんですか。

Hi, Maggie-sensei! I know this is an old answer, but could you perhaps share the other patterns you mentioned?

I always see the structure “If you were A, B would’ve happened” with なっていた.

For example: “君が生きていたらどうなっていただろうか”

Why can’t I say: “君が生きていたらどうなっただろうか”?
Also, would I say “君が生き残っていたらどうなっていただろうか”? Or would I say “君が生き残ったらどうなっていただろうか”?

And in Ron’s sentence’s case, is it possible to say “バスケットボールをやったら”? Isn’t the verbs’ dictionary form used to express habits? So, if he had made a habit of playing basketball during his child he would be goot at it now. Or could I say “とてもうまくなっただろうに”? Why are both “ていた”?

Which of these sentences is correct, if any?
傘を買ったら雨に降られなかったのに
傘を買っていたら雨に降られなかったのに
傘を買ったら雨に降られていなかったのに
傘を買っていたら雨に降られていなかったのに

I gave a lot of examples, but my doubts about all of them are the same one. Thank you very much for your attention in advance. I hope I could express myself well.

Thanks for your reply, Maggie-sensei! I now understand why to use なっていた and not なった.
But I’m still confused… Why is it “傘を買っていたら” and not “傘を買ったら”? And why doesn’t “君が生き残ったら” work for the past?

Aren’t the translations of “傘を買っていたら” and “君が生き残っていたら” “If I had been buying an umbrella” and “If you had been surviving” respectively? Isn’t buying an umbrella a one-time thing, unlike playing basketball?

Does it have anything to do with how ている can express a resultative state of an action?

How would you translate “君が生き残ったらどうなるのだろうか”? In my understanding, it can only be “if you survive, what will happen?” or “if you survived, what would happen?”.

In other words, there is still a chance that “you” may survive. If there weren’t, because “you” is already dead, I would put it in the past tense like in English, like “if you had survived, what would’ve happened”, right?

That’s why I wonder, if I know for sure that the person didn’t survive or didn’t buy an umbrella, for example, and that things would’ve been different if they had done that, then should I always use “～ていたら”?

I’d be very grateful if you could help me again! Thank you for attention.

I won’t go too deep in this comment section but
1) 買う/買った is one time action.
買っていたら focusing on the state of having an umbrella after buying an umbrella but maybe you should just learn by what tense to use.

There are lots of exceptions but generally speaking

You tend to use Vていたら〜 form for an unreal past condition and its probable result in the past.

日本に行ったらマギーに会いたい。 When I go to Japan, I would like to see Maggie. (talking about the future/ A possible condition and its probable result.)
日本に行っていたらマギーに会えたのに。/ 会ったのに。 If I had gone to Japan, I would have been able to see Maggie/I would have seen Maggie. (an unreal past condition and its probable result in the past.)

2) 君が生き残ったらどうなるのだろうか 君 is still alive. You won’t probably survive but what if you do…

What would happen if you survived or survive.

君が生き残っていれば/いたら “if you had survived, what would’ve happened” (The person is not alive)

Aaahh, that’s exactly what I wanted to know! Thank you very much, Maggie-sensei! ^^

You said you wouldn’t go into many details and that there are a lot of exceptions. Do you know where I could read more about it? Or what I should search on Google? I tried some things before but couldn’t find exactly what I was looking for. It’s fine even if it’s in Japanese. Thank you very much for explanation, anyway!

hi maggie, im so happy i came across your website…very helpful.. i have a new japanese friend and he is learning my local dialect..i want to learn japanese too, so its easy for him to understand…can you please post some helpful phrases for friends who gives special attention to each other? thanks maggie…

I really like the way you use colorful fonts, cute 絵文字, and highlights. Thank you for such a great explanation about -tara. Now I know how to explain about the verb conjugation in case anyone asks.I mean I can use -tara but I’ forgot the theory. ;)